The inebriated young man rose unsteadily to his feet. He seemed suddenly angry and said something that began with the word “No.” The rest was unintelligible. He staggered past me and out onto the street. The old man raised his arm—a process that took him nearly ten seconds—until his finger was pointing straight at me. “You,” he said.

I had been in the village of Great Holling for less than an hour, and already two men had pointed rudely straight at my face. Perhaps among the local folk this was a sign of welcome, though I doubted it. “I beg your pardon?” I said.

Father Christmas made sounds that I translated as: “Yes, you, good fellow. Come and sit down here. In this chair here. Next to me, here. The chair that the unfortunate young ne’er-do-well no longer has the need of, here.”

Under normal circumstances the repetition might have grated, but since I was engaged in a translation exercise, I rather welcomed it.

“Actually, I was about to take a stroll around the village . . .” I started to say, but the old man had made his mind up that I should do no such thing.

“There’s plenty of time for that later!” he barked. “Now, you’ll come and sit down, and we’ll have ourselves a talk.” To my alarm, he began to sing:

“Come and sit down,

Come and sit down,

Mr. Policeman from London Town.”

I looked at Meakin, who kept his eyes on his beer glasses. Anger emboldened me and I said to him, “I seem to remember asking you only ten minutes ago not to discuss my business with anybody.”

“I haven’t said a word.” He did not even have the good grace to look at me.

“Mr. Meakin, how has this gentleman found out that I’m a policeman from London if not from your telling him? Nobody else in the village knows who I am.”

“You mustn’t go leaping to conclusions, Mr. Catchpool. That’ll get you nowhere, I expect. I’ve said not a word about you to a single body. Not a word.”

He was lying. He knew that I knew, and he didn’t care.

DEFEATED, I WENT AND sat with the old gnome-like man in his corner of the inn. There were hops and brasses on the dark beams all around him, and for a second he struck me as a strange white-haired creature in an even stranger nest.